My son, it will be many years until you read this, and probably some years after that still until you fully understand what’s written here.

I write to you from outside of time – so that in the future you will know me as I am now, and not just as I am then. I’m addressing you as the man you will be, with God’s help.

My son, we cannot know the future, we can only live in the moment. Not very long ago my heart broke, literally and figuratively, but Your Mother saved me, literally and figuratively, and God gave me a second chance at life, literally and figuratively.

I didn’t stay down for long. One mustn’t stay down for too long.

I took my second chance gratefully, as one must be grateful everyday for the gift of one’s life. Remember that, live by it, it’s very important.

But I cannot tell my future. The shock of a heart attack for a young man, for any man, goes deep; it is still with me, and the fear that it will happen again is never far away. That’s the thing to remember about fear: it’s always there, but it is entirely your slave. You are entirely its master.

I try not to think of what was. Instead I think of the eternity in every moment that you and I share.

I look at Your Mother, and at our families and friends: I stay close to them and so must you – they are our angels.

I look at you, now one month old, and my heart… it…heals.

You melt me completely. You build me up completely.

When you fall asleep on my arm you make it ten times stronger.

When you lie on my chest it becomes a mountain.

When you wrap your hand around my finger no force in the universe can dislodge us.

Your Mother says she doesn’t understand why I’m so tired all the time, as she’s the one that gets up most of the times at nights to feed you.

She says my tiredness is fake, and must be psychosomatic; yeah, I also don’t know what that means. Maybe she means soma-somatic, that would make more sense, no?

She should look these things up before she says them, she’s not a doctor, wouldn’t you agree?

In any case, you should know that I also get up to feed you at night, not as much as your mom does, of course, who could ever get up as much she does??

But I do wake up when you start squealing for food. I may sometimes fall back asleep straight away, but I do wake up, to make sure everything is, you know, in order.

Sometimes I get up just to look at you. I walk over to your cot, lower my face to just above yours, and hover there for a few minutes. Scanning every millimeter of your face. Lovingly stalking you, you might say.

And sometimes, get this, your mother is too tired to feed you in the middle of the night and she jabs me with her elbow, right in my ribs, sometimes also in my neck, and tells me to make you a bottle.

I take these midnight blows without complaining. I carry the bruises inside, quietly, as a man must.

So don’t believe her when she tells you, years from now, that I wasn’t really tired, and that I was involved in some complex psychological sleep conspiracy.

After all, who would you believe, someone like me, who takes the time to set out the truth here for you to see, and who takes blows for you, or someone like your mother, who doesn’t even write a blog?